"The Roaring 20s"

“Normalcy” = Warren Harding’s phrase for “getting back to normal” after WWI. He won the presidency race.

20’s politics

3 Republican Presidents good for business

tariff raised very high

taxes on rich lessened b/c they “penalized success”

unions decline due to good times

laissez faire attitude

Warren Harding – no qualifications other than he looked like one; suffered lots of scandals, esp. the Tea-Pot Dome scandal

Calvin Coolidge – calm, boring, predictable, thrifty, old-timey, very pro-business

Herbert Hoover – talks of “rugged individualism” meaning people should help themselves, not look for handouts. Also, very pro-business.

Changes

“Nativism” = Immigration restricted

New Immigrants weren’t wanted so laws passed to limit New Immigrants but not limit Old Immigrants as much

Sign of times – Sacco & Vanzetti, 2 Italians executed for murder on “iffy” charges

KKK

anti-everything but white Anglo protestant, reached its peak in 20s

used the fear factor to get what they wanted

Red Scare = fear of communists; series of package bombs blamed on communists

Consumerism = buy, buy, buy! On credit!

Fundamentalism = inerrant Bible; “Scopes Monkey Trial” where evolution takes on creation

Prohibition

18th Amendment outlaws alcohol

Bootlegging results, Al Capone

Women

increasingly in the work force

more modern as seen in the “flappers”

Young people = increasingly “modern” and risqué

Harlem Renaissance = rebirth and celebration of African-American culture

music = jazz, Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong

literature = Langston Hughes

art boomed in new ways

Literature

"The Lost Generation" of writers

F. Scott Fitzgerald

Ernest Hemingway

Accomplishments

Charles Lindbergh - flew across Atlantic

Amelia Earhardt - tried to fly around world

Henry Ford and Model T/Model A and assembly line